Brands picture themselves on Tumblr

31% of large brands are active on Tumblr, the blogging platform and social network owned by Yahoo Inc. that allows users to post images and videos, according to a recent study by social media analytics company Simply Measured Inc.

The vendor examined 100 large brands’ social network use from July 5 to Aug. 4. Among the retailers Simply Measured examined were Tiffany & Co., No. 109 in Internet Retailer’s 2013 Top 500 Guide, and Gap Inc., No. 19.

The report found that even though Tumblr use lags behind Facebook (used by 98% of the brands), Twitter (97%), Google+ (76%), Pinterest (74%) and Instagram (68%), many of the brands that are on Tumblr are active on it. Nearly 42% of those with Tumblr accounts post at least three times per week and 19% post at least 10 times a week.

Many brands are using Tumblr in concert with other social networks, the report says.

“This diversification is a new phenomenon among brands; in the past, large brands focused on pouring resources into a specific network or two,” it says.

Images account for 95% of the content that brands post on Tumblr and those photos receive 98% of consumers’ reblogs. On Tumblr consumers can interact with posts by clicking a Like button, commenting on it, or reblogging it, which is similar to a retweet on Twitter in that a user clicks a button to post the same entry on his own Tumblr blog, which increases the posts’ exposure.

The report found that the brands’ posts spark a lot of engagement. Each post receives 1,462 notes—which include Likes, comments and reblogs—per post.

A large part of Tumblr’s appeal, the report says, is that posts on the platform have a longer shelf life than posts on most other social networks. Nearly 33% of consumers’ reblogs of the brands’ posts took place more than 30 days after the brand initially posted the content.